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Although the HR frequency was often improved when hygromycin B wa

Although the HR frequency was often improved when hygromycin B was used for selection of transformants, the difference in frequency was estimated to be less than 10% in favor of the hph cassette by comparison of disruption experiments on the tnr locus using both markers (14, 23). With regard to selectable markers, the higher HR frequency in the TmLIG4-disruptant indicates that

the NHEJ pathway in T. mentagrophytes is mainly dependent on TMKU80-TMLIG4. This finding is supported by the crucial role of Lig4 in the nonhomologous integration pathway in other fungi (12, 40). Moreover, this demonstrates the importance of TmLIG4-disruptants as recipients in gene targeting experiments R788 in vivo for future genetic studies of the dermatophyte T. mentagrophytes. Similarly to other fungal species, the transformation frequency in the TmLIG4Δ mutant was lower than that in the wild-type cells (less than twofold). The subtle reduction in transformation frequency may be attributable to the long homologous sequence stretches. The HR frequencies in the TmLIG4 disruptants did not reach 100% for the four loci, despite the long homologous sequence stretches (Table

2). These results are consistent with those of gene targeting experiments in Pichia ciferrii (40). HR efficiency was click here enhanced from 1% in the wild-type to 87% in the Pclig4 (lig4) disruptant (40). In contrast, disruption of mus-53 (lig4) in N. crassa results in an HI frequency of 100%, even when homologous flanking fragments are shorter than 500 bp (12). Moreover, it has been anticipated that the NHEJ pathway would be controlled

mainly by the MUS-52 (KU80 in yeast)-dependent pathway, Adenylyl cyclase and partially by the MUS-52-independent pathway, and that both require MUS-53 for the final step of the non-HR pathway (12). In A. oryzae, five of the seven inactivated loci using LigD-deficient host cells have an HR rate of 100% (13). Therefore, it is likely that an additional minor TMLIG4-independent pathway contributes to control of nonhomologous integration in T. mentagrophytes. However, another scenario can be also speculated. In this study, the disruption constructs contained either the nptII cassette (to disrupt the TmLIG4 locus) or the hph cassette (to disrupt the other four loci). Due to limitations in genetic manipulation tools, both cassettes contained the same promoter Pch (685 bp) and terminator TtrpC (573 bp) (Figs 1, 4). Thus, each of the four loci disruption constructs were attracted by two pairs of homologous regions in the TmLIG4 Δ mutants: (i) homologous flanking fragments of about 2 kb to disrupt the gene of interest; and (ii) about 600 bp of homology resulting from use of the same promoter and terminator in the selection cassettes. Because long homologous fragments are preferred for HI, the majority of integrations occurred in the locus of interest. Accordingly, less than 100% HR frequency may be observed in TMLIG4-deficient strains.